Please join Longfellow Books, the MWPA, and Mechanics’ Hall for a conversation for these times with longform nonfiction writers Justin Ellis and Virginia Eubanks. The conversation will be co-moderated by Gibson Fay-LeBlanc, Executive Director of the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance, and Samaa Abdurraqib, Executive Director of the Maine Humanities Council.
In The Cruelty of Nice Folks, Ellis grapples with the personal and collective histories of white supremacy in his hometown after George Floyd’s murder and what those histories might mean for the rest of the country. Library Journal notes, “Ellis grapples with the quiet history of white supremacy in so-called nice Minneapolis in this highly recommended book for readers interested in social justice.”
In A Guide to Open Water Lifesaving, Eubanks also balances memoir and reporting, thinking through how to survive caring for a loved one amid our crumbling health care and social systems. Larissa MacFarquhar writes, "For anyone who's been told that trauma is a chance for growth, or that wounds are where the light comes in, Virginia Eubanks has written a scorching reply to the ‘exhausting bullshit’ foisted on caregivers. A furiously honest, beautiful, and riveting story about how she managed to stay sane, solvent, and loving."
Free event with RSVP.
Longfellow Books will have copies of both books for sale. Bold Magazine will be on hand with a curated selection of “of the moment” magazines.
Justin Ellis
Justin Ellis is a writer. His first nonfiction book, The Cruelty of Nice Folks is now available from Harper. His day job is projects editor for Defector, an employee-owned media company, where he oversees podcasts like Normal Gossip and Namedropping. His TV credits include Wyatt Cenac’s Problem Areas on HBO and How to Fix a Drug Scandal on Netflix. In his previous lives he has been a podcast host, magazine editor, media business reporter and a newspaper beat writer. Over the years he’s worked at organizations like ESPN, The Nieman Journalism Lab and The Portland Press Herald. His writing has appeared in publications like The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Boston Globe, GQ, DC Comics and Dwell. He was the host of ESPN’s Doubletruck Stories, a narrative podcast showcasing features and investigations from ESPN writers.
Virginia Eubanks
Virginia Eubanks is a longform investigative reporter, essayist, memoirist, and Associate Professor of Political Science at the University at Albany, SUNY. She is the author of A Guide to Open Water Lifesaving: Lessons on Love and Survival (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, August 2026). She is also the author of Automating Inequality: How High-Tech Tools Profile, Police, and Punish the Poor; Digital Dead End: Fighting for Social Justice in the Information Age; and co-editor, with Alethia Jones, of Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around: Forty Years of Movement Building with Barbara Smith. Her investigative reporting and personal essays have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Scientific American, The Nation, Harper’s, and Nature. With Andrea Quijada, she is the co-editor of a forthcoming collection of oral histories, Not a Number: Global Stories from the Automated Welfare State. She has been a fellow or resident at MacDowell, Edward Albee, New America, Carey Institute for Global Good, and Blue Mountain Center. When not sleeping in her truck in the Adirondacks, she lives in Troy, NY.
Samaa Abdurraqib
Samaa Abdurraqib currently serves as the Executive Director of the Maine Humanities Council. Samaa is a certified as a Maine Master Naturalist, which allows her to lead outdoor teaching experiences for people who want to learn about the beings (plants, insects, animals) in this region. Recently, Samaa’s poetry can be found in Cider Press Review, december magazine, and Obsidian: Literature and Arts in the African Diaspora. She’s the editor of From Root to Seed: Black, Brown, and Indigenous Poets Write the Northeast (2023) and the forthcoming collection Cape Cod to Nova Scotia: Art, Ecology, Poetry of the Gulf of Maine (2027). She has been supported by residencies at Hewnoaks, Monson Arts, and Hog Island Audubon. Samaa’s chapbook, Towards a Retreat, was published by Diode Editions in August 2025, which was named as the 2026 Eric Hoffer Chapbook Award winner.
Gibson Fay-LeBlanc
Gibson Fay-LeBlanc is a writer and nonprofit arts leader. His first collection of poems, Death of a Ventriloquist won the Vassar Miller Prize, and his second, Deke Dangle Dive, was published by CavanKerry Press in 2021. His poems have appeared recently in magazines including Narrative Magazine, Poetry Northwest, and Orion, and a poem was awarded the 2025 Marvin Bell Memorial Poetry Prize by December Magazine and Maggie Smith. He has served as Executive Director of the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance since 2019 and has previously helped lead community arts organizations including The Telling Room, SPACE, and Hewnoaks.